


salt and sand

by thorkidumpster



Series: like ivy grows [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Beaches, Domestic Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Minor Injuries, Schmoop, Summer Vacation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-02
Updated: 2019-06-02
Packaged: 2020-04-06 11:58:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,403
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19062226
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thorkidumpster/pseuds/thorkidumpster
Summary: a continuation of sharp teeth and tender lips, wherein loki takes thor on vacation to the beach.





	salt and sand

**Author's Note:**

> i am not the boss of you, but you'll probably want to have read the previous story here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18740713

 

* * *

  

_Oh, and by the by, there’s something I need to discuss with you._

Thor stared hard at his phone’s screen—brand new, purchased for him only a week ago—and gulped. He knew he was being ridiculous, because even if Loki was upset with him  _which Thor knew he wasn’t, dammit_ , Loki would never break up with him through a text.

It was just the lawyer bleeding through; sometimes Loki, when harried or stressed, would slide into an intensely formal tone of text—well, harried or stressed or whenever Thor teased him about being a man in his thirties and still texting like a teenager.

 _sure_ , he messaged back,  _im all virtual ears_

The phone vibrated a moment later, with Loki’s face popping up on the screen. The picture had been taken while he was mid-sneeze and Loki would probably kill him if he knew Thor still had it, but it was one of his favorite pictures of Loki. He let himself snort back a chuckle, then answered.

“You’ve reach The Perfect Boyfriend Company, how can we make your day Thor-tastic?”

“Well,” Loki replied, smooth, “You could start by shoving your phone down your pants and sending me a—”

“See, now, I always heard dick pics were a bad thing.”

“Perhaps for others, but I always want pictures of you.”

Thor faked a gasp. “Even while you’re in the office, Mister Laufeyson?”

“ _Especially_  while I’m at the office,” Loki grumbled. “Liven up my day.”

“Be careful what you wish for,” Thor teased. He could already imagine sending those pictures—he knew Loki checked his texts almost immediately, even if he couldn’t always respond at that moment. The little ‘read at’ message had haunted Thor for the longest time, before he realized that but—but Loki would be in a meeting, or with a client, and he’d feel his phone vibrate in his pocket. When he unlocked it, would he keep a straight face? Or would his eyebrows pinch like they did when he started getting horny?

And he’d have to sit through those boring hours, punctuated by his phone buzzing against his thigh as Thor sent picture after picture of his cock, his pecs, his ass all stretched around a toy…

Loki would punish him, no doubt, for being such a slut.

Thor shifted, his sweatpants tented. He lazily rubbed at his cock through the fabric, more to enjoy the feeling than to come. “But hey, what’d you want to talk about?”

“I’m going on vacation in a few days, for a week.”

Thor kicked his thin flat sheet off the bed, mood soured. “Guess I won’t hear from you much, then?”

“Actually…” Did Loki sound nervous? There was a slight hesitation to his words Thor hadn’t heard before. “To be honest, it’s short notice, but I was rather hoping you might join me; I know your classes don’t start again for a week, so it’d work out perfectly. If you want to come with me, of course.”

Thor shot upright. “Really? No, absolutely, of course I want to come to—where are we going?”

“The beach,” Loki replied. His voice returned to its usual warmth and richness, and since no one was around to see it, Thor let himself smile like a dope. “So pack up sunscreen—” Loki’s tone dropped into sinfulness. “and forget the trunks, because the beach is  _private_.”

– – –

Thor packed trunks.

It wasn’t that he didn’t believe Loki about the private beaches and all, but people had a way of worming into areas they weren’t supposed to be, and he really didn’t want someone judging his dick for being all shriveled and cold.

Also, dick eating sea monsters.

Loki picked him up from the apartment the next morning, where Thor made a hasty farewell to Blindi, who just snorted and waved him off with a plaintive, “He’s never taken  _me_  anywhere.”

“You have summer classes!” Thor called and closed the front door quickly to avoid any rebuttal. He was glad it was just Loki and him—together, alone on a beach, sleeping in the same bed for a whole week—

_he’s just taking you bc you sleep with him, sugar baby ;) ;) ;)_

Thor blinked down at the text. It was a joke, he knew—Blindi had been nothing but accepting of the relationship, even teasing Thor to haggle pizza or beer money out of Loki. It was a friendly thing, but something in him shifted and he found himself frowning.

“Thor?”

“Jesus!” Thor jumped. “Loki, Christ.”

Loki stood at the foot of the stairs down to the parking lot, smirking. “Are you coming? Or do you want to spend the vacation staring at your front door?”

“Coming, coming!”

“I mean,” Loki drawled, “if you need help carrying all that luggage, you poor flower—”

“Shut up,” Thor chuckled, bounding down the steps two at a time. “Asshole,” he chided as he kissed Loki hello, then kissed him again just for the hell of it. Then again—because he could—

Loki extracted himself with a fond groan. “Save that for the beach house.”

“All of it?” Thor teased. He tossed the book bag full of his clothes into the backseat of Loki’s car, wrinkling his nose at the uncovered leather. At least Loki finally capitulated to Thor’s request of a fabric seat cover for the passenger’s side—getting his ass glued to leather with sweat was exactly zero fun.

“Hm.” Loki slid into the driver’s seat like a snake, all cool efficiency. Even in dark-wash jeans and a t-shirt that probably costed more than Thor’s monthly gym fee, he still looked damnably put together. “No. Perhaps we’ll find a quiet stretch of road—I confess, I’ve never gotten road-head before.”

Now that just sounded like a challenge.

– – –

Loki didn’t get his blowjob—they were too busy quibbling over the radio station. Loki, the heathen, despite all evidence to the contrary, actually  _liked_  mindless pop-y numbers.

Thor was more of a classic rock guy, something that made Loki pull a puckered face like he bit into a lemon. “You just like it because it’s popular,” he’d complain—a familiar argument that made Thor pinch him and reply, “I could say the same for you!”

But the trip passed well enough, with mundane talk of work and returning to school, and the occasional game of ‘Cows On My Side’. Loki must’ve been cheating somehow, Thor decided, after they passed by the third cemetery and he lost all his goddamn cows.

_All two of them._

“Twenty!” Loki sang.

Thor just gave him the stink eye.

They entered a cute little town hours later, the buildings all painted cheerful and friendly colors, cluttered together like old women gossiping at the salon. Charmed by the wear the sea winds and spray had left, Thor fell in love. He could live here, he decided, darting a glance at Loki.

It was still another hour, though, before they pulled into a driveway lined with tough, weedy grass poking out of sand dunes, and the grit of it grinding under the tires.

“Here we are,” Loki said, exhaustion creeping into the edges of his voice despite the early midday hour.

Thor just gaped—the house was cute in that beach-y way, with soft pastel colors and the scalloped fringes like on a gingerbread house. The front porch was an off-white, and Thor was willing to bet his soon-to-be degree that there was a covered one in the back, overlooking the ocean.

God, the  _ocean_. The water stretched out into the horizon, shimmery and dark blue, and it frightened him a little, because the biggest body of water he had ever seen before was a quarry lake, but this—there was no end to this.

The cries of the seagulls were jarring and unfamiliar.

Strangeness and awe settled over Thor—it wasn’t unlike his first day seeing the freshmen dorms at college for the first time. A sense of new, a rattling in his soul. It was one thing to see the ocean on the drive, and to hear the muted birds through steel and glass and moving car, but here—in the open—

Thor became aware of Loki’s anxious staring, his sharp eyes narrowed, lips tight with worry—he was nervous, Thor realized. Afraid he wasn’t going to like it.

“This is amazing,” Thor said, a grin spreading over his face. It was, now that he had started getting used to the view. “You own this?”

Loki’s face relaxed. “No,” he chuckled. “It’s just a rental. But I want to, one day. Maybe in two or three years.”

“Part of your five year plan?” Thor teased.

“Absolutely.” Loki nodded seriously. “Step one was getting a cute baby boy.”

Cheeks pink, Thor deflected with, “Shut up and help me unpack.” They hadn’t talked about—about that word in months, since Loki jokingly called himself Thor’s fairy god-Daddy.

“You packed?” Loki said, mock outraged.

Thor just rolled his eyes and tossed his backpack at Loki, who caught it with an  _oof!_. He hefted the bag in one hand, raising a brow at Thor.

“It’s not all clothes,” Thor huffed.

The other brow raised.

“It’s also lube and condoms. I splurged on some… special types.”

Like a kid on Christmas morning, Loki actually lifted the bag up to his ear and shook it, as though he’d hear the tell-tale rattle of a box of condoms. “Well, then,” he said, not bothering to hide his hungry expression. “I’m sure unpacking can wait. Shall we take a tour?”

A ‘tour’ leading straight to the bedroom, no doubt. Just to be an ass, Thor shrugged and took his time unloading the trunk, making sure to bend over extra far when he fished out the cooler of food. “We don’t want anything to spoil,” he said mildly. Loki had filled it with the express desire to not have to go grocery shopping the very second they arrived.

Loki gave him a faux wounded look, but shouldered the bag and accepted the suitcase Thor passed him, filled with his own clothes. Arms duly occupied, they made their way to the front door, with Loki jangling keys around to unlock it.

The air had a slightly stale smell, not unpleasant, just the lingering memory of people come and gone. Thor glanced around, then made his way to the cute kitchenette across from the living area and sat the cooler down. He busied himself with unpacking—fruits, some packaged pre-cooked meats, bread, and a small assortment of vegetables. Enough for dinner tonight and breakfast in the morning before they would need to find a market.

Meanwhile, Loki dropped his burdens on the couch with a groan, bitching under his breath about being too old for that while Thor just snorted. 'Too old’, right, because that’s the sense Thor got the last time they snagged some time together and Loki already had him on his knees, right there on the inner doormat of his apartment.

After the food had been packed away into the pristine fridge—almost uncomfortably clean, Thor had never in his life seen the inside of a fridge shine like it was brand new—he cracked open the window over sink that faced a portion of the beach.

Instantly the smell of salt and sea brine filled his nose, tangy, and the gulls’ screams filtered in. The more he stood there, scanning his eyes over the beachfront, the more settled he felt.

Just a relaxing vacation with his boyfriend. A whole week together.

That was an interesting thought, since the most they’ve done was spend a short weekend together. He had a feeling this would present new challenges, but also a hope that it would be nothing they couldn’t overcome.

Thor shook his head. God, did  _that_  sound sappy.

Loki, meanwhile, was following Thor’s lead and throwing open all the windows in the living area, as well as the sliding door to the back porch Thor had been right about.

Task complete, Loki turned to face Thor with an almost sulky expression. “ _Now_  can I show you the bedroom?”

Thor just cocked his hips, affecting a thoughtful look. “Hmm… I don’t know,  _can_  you?”

– – –

Thor knew Loki was by no means weak, but the lifting and carrying him to bed came as a bit of a surprise.

It was also insanely hot.

– – –

Somewhere between the ribbed condoms and kissing the smears of fruit juice off each other’s mouths, the topic of a trip to the beach came up, one that Loki dismissed with a growled  _“Later”_  before he dived back down between Thor’s trembling thighs.

'Later’ came to be around evening, where the burning red sun began a gentle descent into the ocean. Thor skidded off the back porch, slipping a little in his new flip flops—as soon as he reached the shoreline, he kicked them off, eager to dig his toes into the sandy water for the first time.

Loki followed at a much more sedate pace, trailing behind with a folded recliner chair and a mint green towel. He set up the chair a few paces from the water and plopped himself in it, utterly unrepentant about his lack of clothes. “Private,” he grumbled at Thor’s glance, mistaking it for judgmental rather than the appreciative look it was. He waved a hand around the empty beach, with not another soul nor house in sight.

Thor just laughed at Loki’s fussing and waded into the water until it reached his torso. He didn’t feel comfortable going any deeper than that—who knew if there were sharks here, or maybe the sand would give out under his feet to drop him in the black, cold waters of the deep ocean. He shivered at that thought.

But the water here was still warm from the sunny day, and Thor gently lowered himself onto his back until he was floating, though he remained mindful of his distance from the shoreline.

He let himself drift in the warm water staring at the kaleidoscope of purples and oranges in the sky, the clouds lit and fluffy. But as the light began to fade in true darkness, Thor paddled himself back to land where Loki waited with a faint smile on his face.

“What?” Thor asked. He grabbed Loki’s offered towel and ran it over his chest before sitting down in the sand next to Loki’s chair.

“Nothing, Aphrodite,” Loki teased.

Laughing, Thor made a show of flexing his muscles—one that his lover enjoyed vastly, if the twitch of his dick was anything to go by. “I’m missing the seashell. And the boobs.”

Loki reached down to tweak a perky nipple, his whole body shaking with mirth as Thor squawked and batted his hand away. “I don’t know about that.”

Which started a shoving match that ended with Loki’s recliner overturned, two grown men shrieking with laughter, and them rolling around in the sand, getting it  _everywhere_.

They scooted back inside when the moon brought out all manner of pinching, grasping things, trailing sand behind them like parts of their skin, laying stark on the floor. When Thor offered a shared shower, eyes a dangerous blue in the still dark house, Loki readily agreed. It was slow work, and deeply satisfying, the sweep of their hands over each others bodies, replacing the grit of the sand with luminous bubbles of soap.

 _Loki,_ Thor sighed into the steam and Loki echoed him with Tho _ _ _r___  and wrapped his sudsy hand around the both of them until they came with quiet gasps.

Their bodies were still damp when they fell into bed, humid moisture beading on the tender places of folded skin at their knees, and elbows, and between their thighs. They laid with the covers off as the spinning fan above dried them more completely than the fresh towels that had hardly been used.

Tomorrow was shopping and more lazing on the beach; kitschy tourist spots and all the local restaurants Thor knew Loki had programmed into his phone.

– – –

“Loki, just let me—”

“ _Move,_  Thor.”

“What? No, I need to shave.”

“Wait your damn turn!”

“I’ve got more beard than you, I should get to go first—”

“Age before beau—ah!  _Thor._  Will you just—fucking—move?”

– – –

Breakfast was an awkward affair, both of them sniffing at each other, little missed patches of gruff hair peppering their cheeks. Because as it turns out, the two sinks and vanities in Loki’s apartment that Thor used to tease him about  _were_  actually very necessary to the health of a relationship.

Go figure.

But it only took one squabble over the last piece of fruit for them to make up.

Well, one squabble and Loki bent over the edge of the counter, shaking and panting as Thor methodically ate him out. But who was counting?

When Loki finally collected himself and his knees stopped knocking together—and Thor managed to just only contain his smugness at the state he left Loki in—a basic shopping list was made and agreed upon.

Neither felt much like cooking, but they needed snacks and some essentials. Fruit was added with a shared, smirking look between the two, along with a can of whipped cream. Plenty of eggs and meats for Thor—those muscles don’t support themselves—and some especially calorie dense foods for Loki, who ate like a bird, but woke up at the ass crack of dawn to run around like a crazy person.

(He called it jogging. Thor called it self-inflicted torture.)

Shopping took the better part of the morning, with the two of them acting like teenage boys again, giggling and waving around cucumbers with suggestive eyebrow waggles.

The looks of disapproval they got were palpable, but frankly Thor didn’t give a shit. He’d do anything to keep that open, young look on Loki’s face. Anything.

He found a secret thrill in standing next to Loki as the other man cocked his head,  _hmmm_ 'ing and  _uhhh_ 'ing over different brands of cereal. A box in each hand, Loki studied the nutritional information like it held the map to El Dorado, lips moving over the words and eyes narrowed at the grams of sugar.

“Thirteen!” Loki said, jackhammering his finger over the offending line. “Thirteen grams of sugar! Can you believe?”

“Loki, fruits have more sugar than that.”

“That doesn’t mean I need more of it,” he sniffed, then tossed a box of flax cereal into the cart that would probably taste like cardboard. Thor made sure to grab some honey to sweeten it with on his way out. Maybe some cut up bananas…

A sheet of rain greeted them when they finally left the store with way more groceries than they could possibly eat in a week. The humidity already had the ends of Loki’s hair curling and him cussing over the weatherman promising clear skies all day.

But Thor enjoyed the smell of the clean wet, like a wave of freshness pulled over the world. The rain smelled different here, he noted, and chalked it up the the sea.

“Quickly, quickly!” Loki griped good-naturedly as they carried the groceries from the car to the house—just the few feet had the paper bags soaked through.

Thor cast a critical look out of the window. “We’re still going out to eat, though.”

“It’s a good thing I went crazy and got a  _water proof car_ , then.”

Thor whacked him with a piece of celery.

– – –

“You know I’m allergic to shellfish, right?” Thor said, offhand as Loki made to turn into what looked like a crab-shack.

Loki’s face went white. “Yes. Of course,” he said, then swerved to pull into an Olive Garden across the street like that’d been his goal the whole time and he hadn’t cut off three lanes of traffic. “I knew that.”

“We can still go in, I’ll just have to be careful—”

“No,” Loki said forcibly. “I’ll find a time to eat crab when it won’t kill you.”

Loki was on his phone a suspicious amount during their lunch, but Thor knew it was because he was reworking their entire 'eating out’ itinerary.

– – –

The next day, Thor purposely messed that schedule up and took them to a fish market. He smiled into his fish and chips as, after a minor amount of prodding and his EpiPen out on the table for Loki to see ( _It's_ fine,  _I don’t really need it—it’s not that bad, just for extreme—_ no, _I’ve never used it before—_ ), Loki dug into a plate of crab legs until he was fat and smiling and covered in butter.

Unable to kiss him on the mouth yet due to lingering allergens, Thor settled for kissing the small swell of Loki’s belly that night, happy that he was happy.

– – –

Their week passed much the same way, in awful little tourist traps and taking pictures by the sea to send to everyone and their moms—Frigga in particular was delighted.

 _Look how tan you are!_  she texted, then shared the picture of him half-naked and grinning all over FaceBook, right next to a baby picture of him in the bath.  _'He always loved the water!’_  the caption read.

The album grew steadily, filled with new beach pictures and old ones of swimming classes and summers spent in public pools. He showed Loki, then snapped a discreet picture of the soft look on his face.

(He sent that one to Frigga, too, and was met with a motherly demand that he needed to introduce them formally as soon as he got back.)

 _maybe not 'as soon as’_  he replied.  _but… around the holidays?_

 _October_ , Frigga bargained.  _We can’t just spring Thanksgiving on him!_

Thor sent her a picture of his pinkie as a promise.

And so they moved through the summer days, relaxed and pulled loose as taffy, tacky with the sweat that the ocean would always wash off. That was a commodity Thor refused to let pass him by—every time they were at the house (that a secret part of his heart had started to call  _home_ ) and weren’t fucking or otherwise occupied, Thor was out in the water, swimming in and out and stopping only to stare at the blue horizon and wonder if he might ever see the other side of it.

– – –

They tried once to have sex on the beach.

It lasted about five minutes before they stopped, swearing up and down to never attempt that again.

Five minutes of fun and two days for Thor to dig all the sand from his butt crack.

– – –

They tried again three days later with a lot more towels and slightly more success.

– – –

“Your classes start on Monday,” Loki brought up Thursday morning.

Thor poked around in his bowl. The flax cereal had mushed into something resembling oatmeal. “Yeah.”

Loki reached over the tiny kitchen table and covered Thor’s hand with his own—almost a full week of nude sunbathing had given him a tan, turning the white of his skin into a faint golden glow. He was only two steps above his usual painfully pale, but—he looked good. Healthy. Strong. “We’re leaving tomorrow.”

“I know,” Thor sighed. Loki’s hand was a warm weight, comforting and grounding. “But it’s my last year,” he said, perking up a bit. “Maybe… maybe we could do this again next summer? After I graduate?”

He said it quickly, worried he might’ve crossed some invisible line.

But Loki just smiled. “I’d like that.”

They tidied up with a bit more thoroughly afterwards, aware of the cleaning and packing that was awaiting them at the end of the day and the next morning. It wouldn’t hurt to already have things nice in preparation, to make everything smoother.

Thor elected to spend his last day on the beach, with Loki planting his ass in his customary recliner, naked as the day he was born. He hadn’t once so much as dipped a toe into the ocean, but Loki never voiced any desire to.

(Thor wondered sometimes if Loki couldn’t swim, or maybe avoided the water on principle, but he didn’t ask. If Loki wanted to spend what was probably an insane amount of money to lay in the sun and watch Thor splash around like a kid, that was his choice.)

The day was passed in long stretches of beach and sun and sand, broken only by their trips inside for food, or water, or more sunscreen. Each time Thor bounded out of the house, his will to return diminished. He had this last day—these final hours—and leaving felt like it might break some spell.

He’d taken to the water like a dog—sometimes, he’d catch the tiny waves, letting them push him back towards land, and wonder what it would be like to surf the massive ones. He decided then and there he was going to next year, when they went back to the beach—he’d be sneaky, suggest that maybe the visit Hawaii so Loki can relax with a massage while Thor goes out into the jewel blue water…

It was a nice fantasy, but Thor knew he’d be happy just to still have Loki next year. And the year after that, even. It was getting startlingly hard to imagine a life were Loki wasn’t present in some way, from a Friday night date, to a text away in the middle of a lonely night. How Loki had invaded his thoughts, at parties where Thor will catch a glimpse of long black hair and his heart would lurch excitedly, or outings with friends only for Thor to see something—anything—that reminded him of Loki.

On the shore, Thor could hear Loki singing along with a silly pop song on his portable radio. The sun was dipping down and tears stung at his eyes, a mixture of happiness and longing.

That’s when it caught his eye—a plastic bag, drifting in the water. Mood souring at the litter, Thor scowled and swam over to it, intent on getting the garbage picked up and recycled. As he reached for it, there was a single moment where something felt off, but the stinging, awful pain ripped across his forearm and made him scream before he heeded the alarm.

_“Thor!”_

Loki shot out of his chair, tripping in the sand as Thor stumbled back to the shore. “Thor! What happened—are you— _Christ._ ”

Thor held his arm out, a lightning shock of angry red welts spreading across his skin. He was hissing, clutching the uninjured side of the arm so hard his knuckles were turning white. “Loki—”

“A—A jellyfish stung you,” Loki said, words coming too quickly, crashing over themselves in a rush to leave his tongue. “Okay.” He nodded decisively. “Okay. Right. We can take care of this.”

He was acting confident, but Thor could see the very real fear in Loki’s too-wide eyes. The pain was… manageable, if he breathed with its flow. Thor tried to think of what he knew about jellyfish stings, but all he could remember was—he bit his lip and made a show of eyeing Loki’s cock. “Loki—you aren’t going to pee on me, are you?”

“Pee— _no_. We’re going to go inside and—and rinse it with water and vinegar.”

“Oh, good,” Thor said, already making his way back to the house. “Because I’m not quite sure our relationship is ready for that.” He turned to face Loki, a smile cracking through and laughter quivering at his shoulders despite the hurt.

Loki just stared at him, dumbfounded. “Just… just get in the fucking house, Thor.”

“I mean, unless of course you want to?”

“ _Thor_.”

– – –

The house was woefully ill equipped with anything beyond basic first aid, but Loki found a pair of eyebrow tweezers in the bathroom and after poking around, Thor located a huge jug of vinegar above the stove. He knew Loki had said something about jellyfish stings and vinegar and set it out, figuring it couldn’t make it hurt  _more_.

Loki led him over to the kitchen sink and fiddled with the nobs—he couldn’t seem to decide if hot water or cold would be best, so he finally settled with half and half. Carefully, Thor lowered his arm under the stream of water, then clenched his teeth on a howl—it was like being stung anew, all over again, as surely as if he had dragged the damn jellyfish over the tender area of his underarm.

Ever perceptive, Loki immediately asked if he was okay. Thor just gritted his jaw and nodded, because even though the pain was lancing its way back into his bones, he knew this had to be done.

(Later, he will do what they should’ve done in the first place and Google how to properly care for a jellyfish sting—then tease Loki mercilessly as he learns that the fresh water had only made the stingers release more toxins. To which Loki will respond, “Dammit, Thor, I’m a lawyer, not a doctor!” A reference which, to his complete horror, will utterly go over Thor’s head.)

“I guess this means no more swimming,” Thor commented, mostly to fill the air and distract himself from the pain.

Loki hummed. On the counter, the gallon jug of vinegar and the pair of tweezers made Thor wince at thought of what was to come.

“It sucks. I’ve really had fun—I want to try surfing, but there’s just not the right kind of…” Thor waved his hand vaguely. “I bet Hawaii’s great for it. Or Australia.”

“I’d offer to take you there” Loki snapped, snatching up the tweezers. “But now I’m fairly sure you’d trip over a poisonous rock and die.”

“Hey now,” Thor said mildly. “Not fair. There’s plenty of people that don’t die in Australia because of the wildlife.”

Loki just gave him A Look. “Let me see that arm,” he replied, testy. He bent low over it, brows a tight line. “Stay still.” As gently as possible, Loki used the tweezers to pluck away the tentacles the hadn’t been rinsed down the drain, depositing them into a plastic grocery bag. Intermittently, he washed the area with vinegar.

Thor kept up his brave face, even as the pain ebbed and flowed.

“So, note to self: being stung by a jellyfish sucks, do not recommend,” Thor joked weakly.

Loki didn’t seem amused—he just worked diligently, rinsing and pulling off the few tentacles that had stuck to Thor’s skin. “There,” he said after a moment, sighing and straightening his spine. “I don’t have any painkillers, and I didn’t see some in the bathroom.” Loki frowned at the kitchen window, now reflecting their images clearly and showing none of the darkness outside. “But I could find a 24 hour store, let me Google it.”

“It’s fine,” Thor said. He didn’t really want to be alone right now—and certainly didn’t feel like going out, even if he stayed in the car. Mostly he just wanted to lay down and curl up on his good side against Loki. “Let’s just wrap this in some gauze and go to bed.”

Loki frowned. “I’m… I’m not sure you should be sleeping.”

“That’s concussions, Loki.”

“Please. We’ll sit on the couch and watch Netflix, but I’m just not—I don’t want—” Loki paused. His jaw worked back and forth stubbornly. It occurred to Thor just how upset this was making Loki, not being able to help him, or even being able to offer something as mundane as a painkiller.

And if Thor knew Loki, that mind was churning with how this was all somehow his fault.

He dredged up a smile. “Yeah. Maybe not an ocean documentary, though.”

That had that faintest of tilts lifting the corner of Loki’s lips. “Absolutely not. We’ll watch whatever you want.”

They settled on some TV show about Nazis and aliens, or maybe alien Nazis—Thor couldn’t keep his eyes open long enough to get that facts straight. He meant to stay awake, he really did, because they’re leaving tomorrow morning and Thor wants every moment he can have with Loki—

But Loki, he realized, will still be there the day after tomorrow, and the day after that, and the day after  _that_  so he let his eyes close and his mind drift, soothed by the gentle pressure of Loki’s thumb rubbing the back of his hand.

 

* * *

 

**Author's Note:**

> if you enjoyed my work, you can always follow me on tumblr under the same name, where i post a bunch of stupid shit and only very rarely anything enjoyable


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